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Wikipedia Founder Jimmy Wales is Launching an Online Publication To Fight Fake News (cnn.com)
Jimmy Wales, a founder of Wikipedia, is launching a new online publication which will aim to fight fake news by pairing professional journalists with an army of volunteer community contributors. The news site is called Wikitribune. From a report: "We want to make sure that you read fact-based articles that have a real impact in both local and global events," the publication's website states. The site will publish news stories written by professional journalists. But in a page borrowed from Wikipedia, internet users will be able to propose factual corrections and additions. The changes will be reviewed by volunteer fact checkers. Wikitribune says it will be transparent about its sources. It will post the full transcripts of interviews, as well as video and audio, "to the maximum extent possible." The language used will be "factual and neutral."
If there's anything I've learned about journalism in the last 41 years, it's that everyone puts their own slant on it. Regardless of their politics.
When Wikipedia was proposed, I thought the original intent was that Wikipedia would be the drawing board for Nupedia articles maintained by professional writers. Is there a similar relationship between Wikinews and Wikitribune?
RTFA? I closed the CNN tab when an ad started playing audio.
...the launch of Wikitribune has been dismissed as a fake news by Jimmy Wales itself.
Rather than write yet more material, why not make a way to consolidate links to various topics in a convenient way so that one can read multiple viewpoints? That way I can see what Fox News says about any given topic, but also what NBC says about the same topic. Use the fancy dancy AI, probably with human helpers, to match up articles about given events.
Table-ized A.I.
What's the difference between what you describe and Google News?
I worry about items to suit a certain political ideology being viewed as "fact", with everything else that contests it being dismissed as "fake news". I see this on both sides.
Are you part of the Illiminati?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Un huh... They'll have their own little *Ministry of Truth* there?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Wikipedia Founder Jimmy Wales is Launching an Online Publication To Fight Anything That Isn't Left-Wing Propaganda
FTFY
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
Professional journalists producing fact-checked, multi-sourced articles with a neutral tone and striving for accuracy ... I thought this was just called journalism? Why do they need amateur community contributors that are guaranteed to be infiltrated and rotten to the core with activists and paid shills?
Crappy interface for finding what you want packaged together nicely and compactly. I don't see any serious attempt to group by a given event. Maybe I missed a magic button somewhere?
Table-ized A.I.
Professional journalists are some of the highest-profile PRODUCERS of fake news. I accidentally tuned to CNN the other night. Holy mackerel. I had no idea that Chicago's rampant crime problem only got really bad when the new administration put the new nation-wide Muslim ban in place. Hopefully Jimmy Wales won't be looking to get Wolf Blitzer involved in fighting fake news, because that's like getting gasoline involved in fighting a fire.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
... it won't happen until FAKE NEWS is illimanated.
The layers of fake news are wrongly arranged, because they are ill laminated.
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
That was my thought as well. This brought to you by the same guy who thinks a valid encyclopedia is one that can be edited by anyone and yet remain factually accurate. And I think far more dangerous than fake news is biased news which is made up of actual facts, but leaves out key details to create a specific perception that is not representative of reality. Fake news is pretty easy to spot. Millions are duped by biased news every day.
I don't believe in karma, I just call it like I see it.
There's a bit of a difference.
MiniTruth in 1984 was supposed to *decide* (i.e.: unilaterally) what is truth and what is not.
They rewrite what is considered thruth : "We have always been at war with East-Asia".
Fact-checking is supposed (in theory) to be about finding the sources of some information :
They try to find where a thing is comming from : Is the number mentioned by a politician pulled-out-of-his-ass ? or is there a real article/sudy/agency reporting these numbers ?
Well, even if "fact-checking" has recently devolved into "calling each-other liars depending on political agenda".
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Your father... was seduced by the Dark Side of the Force. He ceased to be the Jedi Anakin Skywalker and "became" Darth Vader. When that happened, the good man who was your father was destroyed. So, what I told you was true... from a certain point of view.
As long as humans have agendas and perceptions there will continue to be "fake" (from a certain point of view) news. And crowdsourcing the data will only muddle the results not correct them.
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
Oh good. I want Jimmy Wales to be in charge of what I'm told is true and what is false. It is not like people would ever lie about stuff like that for political agendas. I'll trust Jimmy's politics over my own common sense.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
o Publishers - slant, selection bias
...it's not like it's showing any signs of getting better, either.
o Advertisers - selection bias on source and slant by rewarding max eyeballs
o Editors - slant, selection bias for stories
o Reporters - slant, selection bias for sources
o Information sources - slant, winners get to write history
o Reader's choice of media - slant, selection bias
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Citation needed
A leading "fact-check site" regularly uses this bit of dissemblance to describe right-of-center incidents, while left-of-center equivalents seem to get "True" or at least "Mostly true." As with all things, there are exceptions.
They'll do a good job explaining--reluctantly, if we infer from their words--how whatever was said or referenced was, in fact, accurate. Then launch 3 more paragraphs explaining why the facts don't matter because of who said them.
And this was common pre-Trump.
Because this sounds like Snopes but for actual journalism.
It's certainly possible, but if you can actually show me an instance of it, I'd be quite surprised. I don't recall seeing such a thing. Ever.
There's selection bias, where the story that is told is not the only story, and/or leaves out pertinent details that variously pollute the information transfer to the information consumer. This occurs at the publisher, editorial, reporter and information source levels.
There are errors in collecting information, which can be characterized as "impartial but wrong" which entirely undermines the value of "impartial."
There's the social underpinning, such as the assumptions by the platform from publisher down to reporter buy into memes like the drug war, human trafficking, mommyism, military adventurism, etc. as right and proper undertakings and tell stories in the context of the presumptive matrix that results from those memes.
There's ad-pumping, where the advertising pays more money in when more eyes are attracted, which creates a loop based on popularity rather than accuracy.
There's comment "moderation", where "I disagree / am offended / am trolling" can strongly affect visibility of information -- depending on the site, that can come from privileged (and usually wholly unqualified) individuals, as here on slashdot, or from the crowd, as on reddit.
It all adds up to an extremely formidable gauntlet that information has to run in order to get from wherever it arises over to the consideration of the consumer.
And, not that it's part of the problem of actually achieving impartial journalism, but were you to completely get past every aspect of that somehow, then you still have to find an impartial audience or all that work is for nothing.
IOW, if you manage to present the facts, all the facts, nothing but the facts, and your audience cries "fake news" or drags prejudice, superstition, confirmation bias, or anything from a very long list of similar cognitive failure modes into it, well, there you go. You might as well have written an SF novel.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
say what? I read wikipedea for the small sometimes subtle yet hilarious inaccuracies...
If there is still anyone thinking that Wikipedia is in any way neutral, they need do little more than learn a language or two and compare a couple of articles locked for editing. Look at the one for GamerGate. Off the bat, it's described as a hate movement and no credence is given to the participants' claims that they oppose corruption in video game journalism. Now look at several foreign articles, such as the German one, which immediately describes the movement as an anti-corruption movement. You may be on either site of the fence, but either way at least one of the articles has to be very biased given the circumstances. That these people want to check news for facts is the joke of a century.
Obviously you're a democrat/republican shill who hates facts and reason! Fair and Balanced Fake News Filters for all who love Alternative Facts! ..or something!
What do you do when there are people who don't want to read about the truth but rather articles with heavy editorial that they agree with regardless of any bearing on reality? I think that's the real problem we are running into.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
This is an example of how far the Left has strayed from its classical liberal roots.
The very idea that any organization could set itself up to be the arbiter of the Truth in media is anathema to everything a classical liberal believe in.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
And as always, the first comment on Slashdot is a smug, cynical dismissal of the subject at hand.
There are a lot of problems with "fact-based news", the biggest one being identification of actual "facts."
Look at ProPublica as an example. Their MO is generally to take facts and build a giant lie without ever actually lying, technically. I've given them thorough dressings-down for their blatant attacks on the American Red Cross and Amazon, but nobody actually cares because ProPublica has a better hook: take something people trust and convince them that trust has been violated. There are a few good examples here, though.
The familiar American Red Cross attack article on their handling of Haiti claimed ARC lies about the amount of overhead because they hire independent contractors. The reasoning is that ARC keeps 9% of their revenue stream as operating expenses, but their real overhead is around 40% or higher because they hire contractors who also have operating expense--never mind that the contractors are more-efficient than any non-professional, non-expert option, or that the materials have "overhead" because they need to be mined, shipped, and sold. Things aren't magicked into existence, and ARC isn't a vertically-integrated organization with expertise in everything; they generally try to bring the most-efficient solution to a problem, and that means hiring the best contractors they can find, that being the ones who perform at the highest return per cost invested.
ProPublica has repeatedly published ARC internal documents and loudly shouted that ARC is hiding and ignoring serious defects in their organization's handling of major disasters. This one's even simpler: the documents they published were Lesson's Learned documentation. They discussed what problems they had, why they had problems, and any potential methods for avoiding those problems in future disaster scenarios. Many are marked for further review and discussion. The documents ProPublica published are explicitly for the purpose of identifying problems encountered and preventing them in the future, yet they managed to claim ARC is "hiding and ignoring" all of these problems.
Their article on Amazon's "Buy Box" claims they always put Amazon first, even if they're more-expensive. What actually happens is Amazon (almost) always displays the lowest price-plus-shipping option for a particular product by default; and Amazon uses the lowest-price shipping option for that, which is Amazon's Subscribe and Save shipping. You can get free shipping by having $25 of items in your box or having Prime; ProPublica unilaterally applied a non-free shipping option to inflate the total cost. They also nitpicked about Amazon always listing Shipped by Amazon options first in the full list of sellers, even when these aren't the lowest price options; if Amazon didn't do that, they could have instead attacked them for advertising "free shipping" but making it "difficult to find the Amazon-shipped items to actually get it".
Notice the facts. Facts, facts, facts. ARC spent $500 billion, built 6 houses, was going to build 50 but gave up (never mind that the project was determined wasteful and pointless, and people were dying of a cholera epidemic that ARC stopped instead). Amazon shows you their option first and doesn't count shipping in their prices (never mind that free shipping is an option but alternate sellers don't offer it). ProPublica gives facts and tells you what to think about them.
It gets worse.
Jimbo Wales thinks he can fix this sort of un-news. Does he think he can identify and gate out finicky reasoning and spin? Can he identify when facts are missing, or induce others to do so? For that matter, can we identify who has the most-correct and most-complete set of facts, and if they're disclosing them all without ordering them to create an alternate narrative?
It takes some inherent bias to break fake news. I tear down fake articles I understand, and I hit economics pretty hard because I like economics. Fake news isn'
Support my political activism on Patreon.
We don't really need more than that, what we need is a way to flag up fake news and opinion marketed as news.
Or even more prevalent: thinly veiled advertisements and product announcements masquerading as "news".
As long as maximizing revenue is top priority at a "news" organization, journalism will suffer.
slashdot: A failed experiment.
Over fifty people are dead or injured after a truck drove into a crowd of people.
An explosion occurred at soccer game which killed and injured dozens of people.
A white cop shoots unarmed black teenager, sparking outrage over institutionalized racism present in law enforcement.
The editing of news articles by volunteers in a manner like Wikipedia has already existed for a great many years. It is called Wikinews.
Of course Jimmy Wales already knew about that site and is obviously dismissive of the ability of that project's volunteers to objectively look at news information and to distinguish between actual news and fake news.
On a practical side, Wikinews is really quite effective in terms of what it does and also has an interesting set of stories that is quite a bit different than from other news sources. Definitely worth reading for its own sake. The drawback is mainly a lack of eyeballs and the fact that writing a news article is hard work.
Those who object loudest believe the most lies - and they don't want you taking them away.
That could also be an excellent criticism of wikipedia from when it started. If he sets it up so that contributors can throw up [citation needed] on unsourced facts then I think it would be a colossal success. Politicians lie to the news, straight up easily verified lies. I had the CBC change an article about electoral reform by emailing them the wiki link to the Gallagher Index, because the politician was deliberately lying for political gain and they were either too lazy or too self interested to check her facts. I used to go onto the NatPost and GlobeAndMail to post the source documents in the comments section because they were often misrepresented. Journalists are lazy and pushing an agenda - but people like me like to fight them, it's fun, and it's what makes wikipedia work.
man now he gonna run two fundraisers at once my bank account is already cashed out
I'd like to see some sample coverage showing how they would have reported on past notable events.
The Michael Brown incident and the related Ferguson riots would be a good place to start.
The Wikipedia link won't even use the word riots! The URL uses "unrest". LOOOOOOOOL!
My favorite is when they scrub the talk page, too, citing "abuse".
The issue with Google, Facebook, MSNBC, CNN, you name it - is that they're heavily using double-standards.
They just decide that if it does not align with their views, you're censored, fake news, etc. This is terrible and in fact an attack to free speech - even thus a company should be able to do whatever it wants, the reality is that today, if your ISP or Google in particular decide to remove your voice from the internet they can, they will, and today, they do.
Wikipedia has been so far rather successful at keeping a neutral stance though, in their articles. Of course, its not *always* neutral - far from it - but it's *mostly* neutral and that's what makes Wikipedia great: the data is mostly correct, concise, informative!
So basically, even thus this seems to be a very difficult endeavor I truly wish them well and hope they are successful. I for one am happy to hear about points of views I disagree with as long as they're reasonably factual. No more "allegedly-everything".
A leading "fact-check site" regularly uses this bit of dissemblance to describe right-of-center incidents, while left-of-center equivalents seem to get "True" or at least "Mostly true."
It's fun that in a thread where you criticize fact checking and citing sources, you didn't actually mention which site you're talking about (politifacts, I presume ?) nor precise numbers.
(not that I've pointed to litterary / dictonnary sources either).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
WP:LOL!
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
... it won't happen until FAKE NEWS is illimanated.
The layers of fake news are wrongly arranged, because they are ill laminated.
We are Dyslexic of Borg. Prepare to have your ass laminated.
THE SOFTWARE, IT NO WORKY!!!
You just have to wonder at what point does the fight against fake news become the fight against honesty?
Wikipedia covers its legal ass by relying on published elsewhere citations. This is not always insuring honesty and sometime even promoting the continuation of dishonesty. I recall a policy change where any paid editor needs to state being paid and by who, which came up in regards to israeli editors. Only where do you see this editor information on any articles or do you have to research editors per wikipedia article editors to see where there may be subtle bias (and who is going to take the time to do that)? I also have both personal experience and knowledge or incorrect information in a few wikipedia articles, but who will listen?
So when Jimmy comes up with this fighting fake news, its sure sign of using "fake news" as a way to suppress honest news and information.
So lets all jump on the "fighting fake news" bandwagon and realize nothing really changes. But more important, understand why this "fighting fake news" came about in the first place, is simply because people are waking up to the control BS.
Why did the dyslexic illuminatus have his sheild vaccinated?
He was immunising the escutcheon.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
In case anyone was wondering exactly which books this APK is referring to for the Occult / Conspiracy readers ...
Manley Palmer Hall, Secret Teaching of All Ages, or Kindle edition
Albert Pike, Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry
Since it was originally published in 1871 you can find it on Project Gutenberg
Madame Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine
Annie Besant, The Ancient Wisdom
Personally, I wouldn't bother with any of these except the Manley's P. Hall which is an excellent compendium -- especially the original over-sized print version. The full sub-title is "An Encyclopedic Outline of Masonic, Hermetic, Qabbalistic and Rosicrucian Symbolical Philosophy Being an Interpretation of the Secret Teachings Concealed Within the Rituals, Allegories and Mysteries of All Ages". LOL. He actually does a decent job summarizing these.
We now return you to your pointless circle-jerk between Microshaft, Crapple, Linsucks, Bitcoin, etc. ...
--
Apostle Paul the Murder, noun, murderer of Stephen, corruptor of The Way, attempted murderer of James. Why do you people listen to his garbage ego again??
Soon someone will launch an application to fight fake news fighters... and then a fake news fighter fighter... and a fake news fighter fighter fighter... Mine is bigger than yours!
"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." -- H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) --
Of all the conspiracies out there I can count on one hand which ones are true. This one isn't.
And while I agree awareness is good, focusing on the problem means one isn't focused on potential _solutions._
What you are also forgetting is that things are ALLOWED to be the way they are.
i.e. America gets the government it deserves because people won't fucking do a thing to change it. They will bitch, and complain, and then carry on with their life -- letting the government steal the profits of their labor, and then go back to watching the boob tube.
The solution is, and always has been, local community living to a higher standard as a positive role model. Nothing else works.
That's great, yet that is what I donate to NPR for.
Enter the Trump budget - and NPR funds are SLASHED!!!
Now NPR is subjected to corporate donations, and, no doubt, will sway their way
Does it make sense to simply have a national budget for NON-partisan Public News?
An agency where the the top priority is actual, factual news and info?!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
And painfully accurate. How about Jimbo's plan to "fix" mean and ugly Internet comments? That was something called CiviliNation, a failed non-profit he set up with his girlfriend (not sure he was even divorced at the time). On Reddit a few days ago, this was mentioned, and Jimbo insisted that he was the "primary funder" of CiviliNation. Let's see... 2010 Form 990: $25,420 in contributions; 2011: $12,240; 2012: $15,500; 2013: $24,568; 2014: $4,700. All summarized here: https://projects.propublica.or... That's a total of $82,428. If Jimbo were the "primary funder", let's say that's at least 50%, or $41,215. So, if he donated over $41K to CiviliNation, during a period that his gal-pal Weckerle took $63,228 in salary, and there were total contributions of $82,428, he's basically saying he bankrolled most of Andrea Weckerle's personal income from CiviliNation, with tax-deductible dollars. Which accomplished what? CiviliNation.org is barely a functioning website any more -- the last blog post was 13 months ago. Jimbo was so charitably inept that he forked over -- at a minimum -- $41,215 to a failed attempt to "fix" online civility that ultimately accomplished not much more than keeping his girlfriend Andrea in food, clothes, and shelter for a few years. With tax-deductible dollars, no less! And now he wants us to fund his *FOR-PROFIT* plan to "fix" journalism? It's just sad. And pathetic.
Also, due to Wikinews being non-profit, Jimbo can't skim an income off the top. With Wikitribune (owned by "Jimmy Group Ltd" -- I kid you not), all of the money will be in Jimbo's wallet, and he'll dole it out as he sees fit.
Let's not also forget his other fantastic business ventures -- Openserving, Wikia Search, CiviliNation, Impossible.com, and The People's Operator!
Lets start calling fake news by its true, historical name: Gossip.
A better word is: Propaganda
The Torah, Koran, Old Testament and New all condemn those who spread it
All of those books you mention are fake news themselves.
The push to eliminate "Fake News" is not about achieving the truth. It is about sending only one message and making sure that no alternative messages get through. Without "fake news" there will be no opposing voice to the remaining "true news"... which of course will itself just be the only surviving source of "fake news".
How to become a Royal Dictator:
Once you complete these 10 steps you may proceed to pillaging national resources for yourself while your people work and die without choice or compensation.